Internationalization in the Forums

[MrNoli]

Hi there everyone in the LTT Family!

 

I was wondering, if  on behalf of expanding LMG it would make sense to eventually open foreign language forum categories (eg. German, French, etc.) I think it would really be helpful to many, though I admit, that watching LTT, TQ etc. implies you understand English. But maybe it would show, that LMG is goin to think of possibilities, no-one ever did. And it certainly would help getting again more ppl to the channels.

 

It would sure be a very lil effort to implement, and as far as I can see, there are people around that would be willing to help.

 

At least I would. A Community is just as active, as its users.

 

What are your thoughts on that?

 

Greetings from Austria

[Levent]

We had this topic way too many times, even in the early days of the LTT forums back in 2012. This was the previous one, read it up.

 

[dfsdfgfkjsefoiqzemnd]

There are topics in the off-topic section for several languages.  They simply don't get used much because English is the language most people agree on. 

 

German and Dutch come to mind right away, not sure what other languages there are on here.

 

[greenhorn]

@ OP: You might enjoy this German language thread 
 

I too am from Austria, but I didn't post in that specific thread yet since it seems to have become more like a casual chat between a small group of people so it might be strange if I suddenly dropped in on their conversation.

[MrNoli]

To honestly reply, I think it would make more sense to open a section, that is moderated, than to slant people in an off topic position. even though it might sound a bit harsh, but I think that a non moderated, spam filled thread will get peoples mind. And comparing LMG today with back in 2012 is like comparing a Pentium 95 to a CoffeeLake 8800k

 

To much has happened, and the community is still growing. I also think, that it should not count wether if there is a huge or small number of users. WE ALL are part of the Linus family and should be worth the same. And I also think, that meanwhile there is a negligible amount of European users in LTT channels.

 

I also didn't want to put that in too much priority, but letting one thing rest, cause it is not important by now is not the way I think it should be treated. if No-one ever got back to America, most of you wouldn't be here - I assume you know what I wanna say by that.

 

Cheers

[MrNoli]

see that was the nail I tried to hit..... and like Linus says "im fine" I didn't hit my thumb.

 

Also I don't think LMG should limit itself with just English.....and again that is just my point of view!

 

I don't blame anyone with other thoughts. UI just try to start a general discussion, that is not wasted with a off topic chat thread.

 

Cheers

[MrNoli]

6 minutes ago, greenhorn said:

@ OP: You might enjoy this German language thread 
 

I too am from Austria, but I didn't post in that specific thread yet since it seems to have become more like a casual chat between a small group of people so it might be strange if I suddenly dropped in on their conversation.

see that was the nail I tried to hit..... and like Linus says "im fine" I didn't hit my thumb.

 

Also I don't think LMG should limit itself with just English.....and again that is just my point of view!

 

I don't blame anyone with other thoughts. UI just try to start a general discussion, that is not wasted with a off topic chat thread.

 

Cheers

[minibois]

Every LTT moderator speaks English. But if you're gonna open a German, Dutch, Spanish, etc. Section your gonna need a moderator for each section.. and multiple, because mods are people too and need to sleep. Then you run into the trouble finding mods for specific obscure languages and people getting mad they don't have their own section... Etc.

 

No, in my opinion a couple off topic sections for specific languages is the way to go.

This is an international forum, where we wish users of all around the globe can join into any conversation.

 

Although my point of view may be a bit jaded, since my native language does have a thread in off topic 

[MrNoli]

11 minutes ago, greenhorn said:

@ OP: You might enjoy this German language thread 
 

I too am from Austria, but I didn't post in that specific thread yet since it seems to have become more like a casual chat between a small group of people so it might be strange if I suddenly dropped in on their conversation.

A 772 site German unstructured chat. no way....  Till I find something there, ill be a granny

 

[MrNoli]

1 minute ago, Minibois said:

Every LTT moderator speaks English. But if you're gonna open a German, Dutch, Spanish, etc. Section your gonna need a moderator for each section.. and multiple, because mods are people too and need to sleep. Then you run into the trouble finding mods for specific obscure languages and people getting mad they don't have their own section... Etc.

 

No, in my opinion a couple off topic sections for specific languages is the way to go.

This is an international forum, where we wish users of all around the globe can join into any conversation.

 

Although my point of view may be a bit jaded, since my native language does have a thread in off topic 

I agree with you, that it would need people to put that effort in. Its ok to me that way too, but French shouldn't be an issue in Canada, German and Spanish are also widely talked around the world

[MrNoli]

8 minutes ago, Caroline said:

Wait what

I think its no good idea comparing a discussion back in 2012 to today. Think how much has changed in LMG since then.

it was mentioned by Levent, that this discussion started back in 2012.

 

that comparison was related to LMG forums in 2012 ans 2019

[dfsdfgfkjsefoiqzemnd]

12 minutes ago, Minibois said:

because mods are people too

I strongly disagree.  Pretty sure that one of the mods is a Microsoft spambot. 

 

 

 

[MrNoli]

7 minutes ago, Captain Chaos said:

I strongly disagree.  Pretty sure that one of the mods is a Microsoft spambot. 

 

 

 

pls try to be serious, mate. this would be a off topic thread worthy though

[minibois]

13 minutes ago, MrNoli said:

I agree with you, that it would need people to put that effort in. Its ok to me that way too, but French shouldn't be an issue in Canada, German and Spanish are also widely talked around the world

I think you're underestimating the amount of moderators needed to maintain the forum as is, without incorporating 3+ more languages.

Just assume per language you need at LEAST 3 or more moderators, in different timezones too.

 

7 minutes ago, Captain Chaos said:

I strongly disagree.  Pretty sure that one of the mods is a Microsoft spambot. 

 

 

 

At least 5 mods are bots here, for sure!

In terms of efficiency that is!!!

[MrNoli]

15 minutes ago, Minibois said:

I think you're underestimating the amount of moderators needed to maintain the forum as is, without incorporating 3+ more languages.

Just assume per language you need at LEAST 3 or more moderators, in different timezones too.

I think at a community of 500000 it should be doable......

Quote

 

At least 5 mods are bots here, for sure!

In terms of efficiency that is!!!

hm......would imply a bad job of the ltt forum maintainers.....I strongly disagree to that

 

But let us please stay serious and thread related....please

[LogicalDrm]

2 hours ago, MrNoli said:

Also I don't think LMG should limit itself with just English.....and again that is just my point of view!

Problem is that translating is expensive, and thats already done to 2nd largest audience in the world. But at the same time one of the largest pools of people actually speaking same language. Chinese. LMG doing actual content in someother language than English would alienate their major audience, and even if thats not taken into count, they would need to hire fluent speaker to do it. Other than Chinese. Nah, its better to let other major language pools to have their own tech-tubers.

 

As for forums. Moderation of threads would be the issue. This is why I encourage those who need localized forums to look at elsewhere. I know few good Finnish tech forums, and we are among the smallest language pools out there. Moderating this forum is already difficult, and relies strongly on community doing their part. With less moderators community's part would need to be even stronger.

[Levent]

2 hours ago, MrNoli said:

I think its no good idea comparing a discussion back in 2012 to today. Think how much has changed in LMG since then.

it was mentioned by Levent, that this discussion started back in 2012.

 

that comparison was related to LMG forums in 2012 ans 2019

LMG!=LTT Forums

FYI, I said we had this conversation many many many times since 2012, not just in 2012 (like 3 topics every year). LMG is a company, LTT Forums is a community, nobody gets paid and afaik none of the LMG staff actually spend considerable time on forum moderation. Also when did I made a comparison? I just stated that this topic was discussed previously and linked the most recent topic with the same aim (if you were to read you would have seen our forum admins response and reasoning behind not having seperate language forums).

My point is still valid.

 

[spartaman64]

2 hours ago, Minibois said:

Every LTT moderator speaks English. But if you're gonna open a German, Dutch, Spanish, etc. Section your gonna need a moderator for each section.. and multiple, because mods are people too and need to sleep. Then you run into the trouble finding mods for specific obscure languages and people getting mad they don't have their own section... Etc.

 

No, in my opinion a couple off topic sections for specific languages is the way to go.

This is an international forum, where we wish users of all around the globe can join into any conversation.

 

Although my point of view may be a bit jaded, since my native language does have a thread in off topic 

i want a latin section

salve, quid agis hodie

[MrNoli]

1 minute ago, spartaman64 said:

i want a latin section

salve, quid agis hodie

Si ta cuisses,:p

[spartaman64]

16 minutes ago, LogicalDrm said:

Problem is that translating is expensive, and thats already done to 2nd largest audience in the world. But at the same time one of the largest pools of people actually speaking same language. Chinese. LMG doing actual content in someother language than English would alienate their major audience, and even if thats not taken into count, they would need to hire fluent speaker to do it. Other than Chinese. Nah, its better to let other major language pools to have their own tech-tubers.

 

As for forums. Moderation of threads would be the issue. This is why I encourage those who need localized forums to look at elsewhere. I know few good Finnish tech forums, and we are among the smallest language pools out there. Moderating this forum is already difficult, and relies strongly on community doing their part. With less moderators community's part would need to be even stronger.

just use google translate 4Head

[LogicalDrm]

7 minutes ago, spartaman64 said:

just use google translate 4Head

Not accurate enough. There are slurs and other inappropriate comments which would need native speaker to get them.

[minibois]

2 hours ago, MrNoli said:

I think at a community of 500000 it should be doable......

hm......would imply a bad job of the ltt forum maintainers.....I strongly disagree to that

 

But let us please stay serious and thread related....please

This is probably a 'agree to disagree' situation. But feel free to add a poll to your thread to get some more opinions.

 

P.S. I feel like I should mention the 'Binary thread' from a couple years back. It was just randomly made and just people writing random stuff into a binary translator and posting it there. It was locked within a couple pages because.. certain people posted profanity and other not good stuff there and it wasn't as easy for the staff to monitor.. (shoutout to @Tim Drake).

 

These other language threads - in my opinion - have survived for such a long time because of two reasons:

1. The fact that they are small.

2. (At least when they were made) there was staff that spoke the language to at least for the couple first pages could verify it's okay and later on they could quickly sift through any reports from the threads.

 

As awesome as the staff team here is (my previous post was an obvious sarcastic joke, this is serious) I don't think it very feasible to create more language sections.

To out it more clearly, the benefits of having those sections, do not outweigh the cons and the effort needed to make it work.

 

But that's just my opinion.

20 minutes ago, spartaman64 said:

i want a latin section

It's gonna 'veni vidi vici' this forum or get Julius Caesar-ed trying!

[MrNoli]

30 minutes ago, Minibois said:

This is probably a 'agree to disagree' situation. But feel free to add a poll to your thread to get some more opinions.

 

P.S. I feel like I should mention the 'Binary thread' from a couple years back. It was just randomly made and just people writing random stuff into a binary translator and posting it there. It was locked within a couple pages because.. certain people posted profanity and other not good stuff there and it wasn't as easy for the staff to monitor.. (shoutout to @Tim Drake).

 

These other language threads - in my opinion - have survived for such a long time because of two reasons:

1. The fact that they are small.

2. (At least when they were made) there was staff that spoke the language to at least for the couple first pages could verify it's okay and later on they could quickly sift through any reports from the threads.

 

As awesome as the staff team here is (my previous post was an obvious sarcastic joke, this is serious) I don't think it very feasible to create more language sections.

To out it more clearly, the benefits of having those sections, do not outweigh the cons and the effort needed to make it work.

 

But that's just my opinion.

It's gonna 'veni vidi vici' this forum or get Julius Caesar-ed trying!

To reply to that post:

 

thanks for taking the time to answer In such a extend way. I disagree with you, they survived cause they are small.

it seems, some feel offended, if this discussion is coming up again and again. I also think, that such a step should be well prepped. I just am thinking of a possibility to get ltt to a point, where no other big tech channel is. And the fact, that noones has done it before, shouldn’t mean, it never could be an option. I agree with you on the sift thing. It means to find people, that you can count on. And if like mentioned earlier, it would be so small, it should be easily moderable.

 

a poll would be an option, but if only those monitoring the thread would vote, the final poll would be very predictable. NO

we don’t understand what you say, and therefore we could not detect harmness.

 

I hipe u get my point: i dont blame every us citizen, just because there might be a few i****
 

cheers

 

 

 

[colonel_mortis]

There have been a few times when someone has posted something offensive in another language, and it's been a nightmare to moderate. Google translate is fine for formal writing, but slang, insults and humour do not translate well at all. I don't speak any other languages to a level that I can give you any actual examples that would be screwed up in translation, but suffice to say that you cannot moderate by Google translate.

 

If we did have proper support for another language, Chinese would make the most sense because the LTT videos are translated into Chinese, and my understanding is that there is quite a significant following in China. Beyond the language issues, there's all the issues with the great firewall (our emails don't usually make it into China). Basically, that isn't going to happen.

 

For any other language, most (though not all) people who visit this site started by watching LTT videos, and therefore understand English to some degree (or Chinese, but my understanding is that very few non-Chinese people use Bilibili). That means they probably only want an Off Topic section in their native language (who would choose the German version of Troubleshooting when there are vastly more people to help you out in the English version?), which brings us back around to the existing foreign language topics.

 

I am fully aware that creating a section for a different language would attract more people who speak those languages and have more limited English, but I'm sceptical that it would be worth the effort required.

[MrNoli]

3 minutes ago, colonel_mortis said:

There have been a few times when someone has posted something offensive in another language, and it's been a nightmare to moderate. Google translate is fine for formal writing, but slang, insults and humour do not translate well at all. I don't speak any other languages to a level that I can give you any actual examples that would be screwed up in translation, but suffice to say that you cannot moderate by Google translate.

 

If we did have proper support for another language, Chinese would make the most sense because the LTT videos are translated into Chinese, and my understanding is that there is quite a significant following in China. Beyond the language issues, there's all the issues with the great firewall (our emails don't usually make it into China). Basically, that isn't going to happen.

 

For any other language, most (though not all) people who visit this site started by watching LTT videos, and therefore understand English to some degree (or Chinese, but my understanding is that very few non-Chinese people use Bilibili). That means they probably only want an Off Topic section in their native language (who would choose the German version of Troubleshooting when there are vastly more people to help you out in the English version?), which brings us back around to the existing foreign language topics.

 

I am fully aware that creating a section for a different language would attract more people who speak those languages and have more limited English, but I'm sceptical that it would be worth the effort required.

Ok accept the fact, that china would make sense. I also stated in my posts, that most may be good in English. Anyway. This thread can be closed and deleted. 
 

thanks